


You Can't Un-See a Dog

by HolyCatsAndRabbits



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Aziraphale is "just enough of a bastard to be worth knowing" (Good Omens), Aziraphale to the rescue, Clever Aziraphale, Competence Kink, Demon Summoning, Demonic Temptation, Established Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens), M/M, Protective Aziraphale (Good Omens), Summoning Circles, clever Crowley, monster summoning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-23
Updated: 2020-01-23
Packaged: 2021-02-27 13:14:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,467
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22367770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HolyCatsAndRabbits/pseuds/HolyCatsAndRabbits
Summary: A couple of humans summon the demon Crowley to be a sacrifice. Aziraphale is not amused. Actually, wait, he's very amused.
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 206
Kudos: 1170
Collections: Good Omens Holiday Swap 2019





	You Can't Un-See a Dog

**Author's Note:**

> This is a pinch hit for zambo_nutella, who didn’t give a prompt, so I pulled this fic off my back burner and here ‘tis. I hope you all enjoy it! <3
> 
> Time frame: post-canon, with our angel & demon in an established relationship.
> 
> I changed this to a T rating for swearing.
> 
> Edit: You guys, the amazing CardboardFisher ([Tumblr](https://cardboardfisher.tumblr.com/) [Twitter](https://twitter.com/cardboardfisher)) did art for this piece!! You can see it in the fic below.

Crowley blinked a couple of times, not sure he was seeing correctly. The cafe where he’d been standing had suddenly been replaced by what looked like an empty school gym or cafeteria, but long abandoned. There were broken windows, plants growing along the walls, graffiti—and a couple of humans staring at him, looking nearly as surprised to see him as he was to see them.

The important part of all this, of course, was not the walls, windows, or humans. It was the floor, as that was where the white chalk circle had been drawn, sigils carefully marked along the outer edge. A summoning circle.

“Demon Crowley!” the man said, stepping forward. “Serpent of Eden!”

Well, that was what the sigils said. Crowley didn’t answer, just crossing his arms, radiating displeasure, which was actually a thing he could do.

The man pressed on, holding up a book in a gesture of triumph. From what Crowley could see, it was a fairly generic grimoire: black, thick binding, golden pentagram on the cover. “We’ve summoned you to be a sacrifice!” the man announced. “A monster will arise and consume you and thus grant us our greatest desires!”

“Or,” said the demon, in a bored tone, “I’ll be out of here in fifteen minutes and then we’ll see who does the sacrificing.”

“What do you mean?” the woman asked. She was wearing a long red dress, probably something she felt was appropriate for demon summoning, and her blond hair was plaited over her shoulder. She and the man had the same color of hair, similar faces. Brother and sister maybe.

The man hadn’t seen the point in dressing for the occasion, apparently, just jeans and a t-shirt. “Stop it, Anna,” he said. “It’s trying to confuse us.”

“The confusion will come in roughly fourteen and a half minutes,” Crowley warned. When they gazed at him blankly, Crowley pointed to the chalk and said, not unkindly, “You’ve made a mistake with your sigils here.”

“We haven’t!” the man countered. “We copied the spell exactly out of the book!”

Crowley clicked his tongue sympathetically. “Yeah, well, that would be your problem. People often put fail-safes like that in the old spell books. Didn’t want random readers to actually have the power to summon demons, so they made sure that if anyone did, it would be the first and last time. You see this mark here—” and the humans took a few frightened steps closer— “that’s a quarter-hour mark. Means the circle holds a quarter hour only. ” He grinned at them, suddenly. “You are fucked, my friends.”

See this art by CardboardFisher on [Tumblr](https://cardboardfisher.tumblr.com/post/614622191984803840/raffle-piece-for-holycatsandrabbits-based-on) & [Twitter](https://twitter.com/cardboardfisher/status/1247027087568863233)

“Jacob!” Anna cried in distress.

“It’s making this up!” Jacob hissed back.

Crowley shrugged. “We’ll know in thirteen minutes, won’t we?” He removed his sunglasses, taking a moment to polish them on his shirt. When he looked up at the humans, it was with fully yellow eyes with black slits for pupils.

Anna took a step backwards. Crowley smiled. “Yep,” he said idly. “Not even the Guard of the Eastern Gate can get here in the next twelve minutes. Say, while we’re on the subject of you being about to die, does this building belong to anyone?” He gestured with the hand that held the glasses. “Because if it’s abandoned, you’ve done a great job. But if this is somebody’s warehouse or something, you’re going to want to put some tarps down. This is going to be messy.” He smiled again. “And don’t think to run. Most people do, but it never does any good. You see, you’ve bound me to yourselves by summoning me. It really will be best to just have it out here. Easier for—”

“Who’s the Guard of the Eastern Gate?” Anna gasped.

Crowley gave a shiver and his smile faded. _“Don’t_ say his name,” he ordered, snarling a little bit around newly manifested fangs. “He’s the only being in the cosmos that can defeat me. An angel with a flaming sword. Was there in Eden with me. But he can’t save you. Even if you pray to him he won’t get here in time.”

The humans prayed. Loudly. “ _Guard of the Eastern Gate! Please save us!”_

There was no immediate answer. Anna kept praying while Jacob paged madly through the spell book. Crowley just yawned and slipped his sunglasses into a pocket of his jacket. He began to slowly crack the knuckles in his hands.

It took about two more minutes, but then there was a knock at the rusty door. When the humans desperately yanked it open, a man stood there, wearing a very outdated suit of cream-colored clothing, and tartan bow tie. He had white curly hair that fluffed up on top of his head. As well as, of course, the most gorgeous blue eyes in all of creation, but it wouldn’t do for Crowley to mention that right now.

“Who are you?” Jacob demanded, quite rudely, and Crowley wanted to snarl at him for it.

The white-haired man blinked. “I believe someone called for me? Quite urgently. Which is a little odd, to tell you the truth. It’s been a while.” The man stepped into the room and then his eyes fell on the summoning circle and his mouth twitched into a smile.

“Ah,” said the man. “I see.” He folded his hands together neatly. “Well, it seems you’ve captured a demon. And did you need my help with something?”

“Are you the Guard of the Eastern Gate?” Anna asked in a shaky voice.

“Of the Gate of Eden,” the man said. “I was once, yes.”

“Then you’ve got to help us,” Anna pleaded. “He’s going to kill us. He said in fifteen minutes he’d kill us and the Guard of the Eastern Gate is the only one who can stop him, the time lapse circle will be up—”

The man regarded them with confusion. He walked over to where the chalk was drawn on the floor and examined the sigils for a moment. And then he looked up at Crowley, so near that Crowley would have been able to touch him without the damned (pun intended) sigils in the way, and then Crowley could see the ruse click into his mind.

“Ah,” the man said again, with an amused smile. “Well, first let me assure you that you have done the circle correctly. He’s quite helpless.” Crowley did snarl at that, but it was ignored.

“He can’t get out?” Jacob asked.

“No. He wouldn’t have called me if he could.”

“He didn’t call you,” Jacob told him. “We did.”

The white-haired man was suddenly sipping a cup of tea. In a curious voice, he asked, “Are you sure?” The humans stared at him, speechless. “He’s quite the tempter, that one,” the man assured them.

Crowley crossed his arms. “Thank you very much, Aziraphale. Now if you wouldn’t _bloody_ mind.”

Crowley also found himself holding a cup of tea. _“Not_ what I meant!” he growled.

“Well, it’s too early for scotch,” Aziraphale replied.

“Still not what I meant.”

“Patience, my dear.”

“You are testing mine!”

Aziraphale just smiled at him, in that extremely fond way that he had, and Crowley felt his anger melt away. He growled again anyway, but Aziraphale still paid it no mind.

“Aren’t you going to kill him?” Jacob asked in a small voice.

“Oh, goodness,” Aziraphale said with a mild shiver.

Crowley made a face. “Killing’s messy. I did say that earlier.”

But Aziraphale was still talking. “Of course, there _have_ been times when I’ve considered it.”

Crowley managed to bark out, “Likewise, angel!”

Aziraphale raised an eyebrow at him, and now there was a tangible heat between them that was nothing like animosity.

“You guys are _friends,”_ Anna accused.

“An angel and a demon?” Aziraphale looked offended. “Certainly not.”

Crowley smiled. “No, we’re just fu—”

“I beg your pardon!” Aziraphale objected.

Crowley grinned at him hungrily. “Yes, I do love when you do that.”

Aziraphale regarded him with distaste. “Crowley, that is crude. I am not letting you out of there if you can’t have proper manners.” The demon gave a very dramatic sigh, to which the angel remarked, under his breath, _“Drama queen.”_

“Really?” Crowley demanded. _“You’re_ going to go there. _You.”_

Aziraphale’s mouth twisted and he tilted his head a little, as if to concede the point. 

“Are you going to let him out so he can kill _us?”_ Jacob asked, sounding even more terrified.

“Oh, I think he’ll behave,” Aziraphale said kindly.

Crowley glared at him. “You are having way too much fun with this.”

“Do you know,” Aziraphale said, with a delighted smile, “I really am.” He looked at the two summoners. “So what did you intend to do with this demon?”

It was a moment before Jacob answered. “Um...sacrifice him.”

Aziraphale’s face lost all of its humor, but he still spoke lightly. “Oh, I’d really rather you didn’t.”

Jacob got an angry, desperate look on his face. “What, you’re going to stop us? Are you even an angel? Because angels don’t fu—” The word was cut off by Crowley yelling, _“HEY!”_ and Jacob hastily amended it to _“sleep with_ demons.”

The room fell quiet. Aziraphale raised his eyes from his tea cup to regard the humans and somehow, those eyes were different than they had been. Blue but not blue, harmless and human but also sharp and flaming and multiplied everywhere, eyes all around the room. The humans gasped and took a step back. “You could ask me to prove it,” Aziraphale said gently, “but I don’t think you’d like it.”

They shook their heads. And then the angel looked just like a man again. “Who’s the sacrifice to?” he asked, as if he were simply making conversation.

“Cerberus,” Jacob told him. “Beast of Hell.”

The angel frowned at that and shot a look at Crowley, who shrugged.

“That’s not—” the angel held out a hand. The tea disappeared, replaced by the grimoire that Jacob had been holding. “Let me see,” Aziraphale said to himself, paging through the book. Those ridiculous little round glasses materialized on his nose, making him look infuriatingly adorable.

“Oh, dear,” Aziraphale said after a moment. “Yes, that’s a mistranslation. Hmm.” He looked up. “I’m afraid Cerberus is a myth. There is no three-headed dog at the gate to Hell. Hell hounds have just got the one head and in any case, they don’t guard the gate.” 

He took a few steps toward Crowley as he continued to turn pages. “I’m afraid I’ve no idea what they’ve summoned, my dear, but if they do manage to bring it off, then you’re much safer in there. Whatever this is can’t cross the line any more than you can.” He looked at the humans. “Not the best planning there, I’m afraid. This creature won’t be able to get to him inside the circle. So he’ll probably just eat you instead.”

The two of them stared at Aziraphale in horror.

“It was successful, angel, I can feel it,” Crowley said.

“Yes, me too.”

“I’m not staying in here.”

Aziraphale smirked at him, looking delighted again. “You’ll stay in there if I tell you.”

_“Angel,”_ Crowley said, in a very specific tone.

Aziraphale blinked at him. “Oh,” he said gently. “Apologies, my dear.” He waved a hand and the chalk lines wavered and then broke apart, taking a bit of the old gym floor with them. The whole room lurched as the demon stepped out of the summoning circle.

Aziraphale went back to the book, of course, paying no attention to Crowley. To Crowley’s great amusement, Anna almost seemed like she wanted to cry out a warning to Aziraphale as the demon stalked up behind him. But it was too late, Crowley reached the angel and seized him, wrapping his arms tightly around him. Aziraphale didn’t look up, but he gave a little sigh and relaxed in the demon’s embrace, and that was when Crowley finally felt himself starting to cool off. As an angel, Aziraphale could radiate pleasure instead of displeasure, and Crowley was never shy about letting himself soak it up, especially if he himself was the cause.

After a moment, Aziraphale closed the book and removed his glasses, leaning back against Crowley’s shoulder with an adorable little wiggle that he probably didn’t even realize he was doing. Crowley felt it and savored it greedily. 

“What did you mean to accomplish by all this?” Aziraphale asked the humans.

For a moment, neither of them answered, but eventually Jacob admitted, “We need money.”

“Why?”

“It’s my fault,” Anna said softly. “I got into a car accident. The guy hit _me_ , but when he learned I didn’t have insurance, he said he wouldn’t call the cops if I paid for his repairs. I didn’t know what to do, so I stole some money from where I work, and we thought if we could just replace it—”

“And you somehow jumped from petty theft to demon summoning?” Crowley asked incredulously. 

“It wasn’t exactly _petty,”_ Anna confessed. “I don’t know, summoning seemed like a thing to try.”

“We didn’t really think it would work,” Jacob said.

“Why not just go to a loan shark like normal humans?” Crowley asked.

“Loan sharks are dangerous!” Jacob exclaimed.

There was a moment of silence during which the angel and demon regarded the humans with great concern. 

But then Crowley reluctantly released Aziraphale and stepped back. “Angel, I feel it. Whatever it is, it’s on its way.” He rolled his shoulders a little and let his wings erupt, let his fingers lengthen a little into claws. Fortunately, it scared the humans. 

Unfortunately, Aziraphale also felt the need to demonstrate what _he_ thought of the display. “Oh, don’t you look lovely,” the angel said breathlessly. Crowley snarled at him, but of course, Aziraphale paid it no mind.

“How—how does that happen, an angel and a demon?” Anna asked.

Aziraphale shrugged mildly. “Fuck if I know.”

Crowley’s mouth dropped open. “I beg your pardon.”

The angel just laughed. 

Crowley crossed his arms over his chest and frowned at him. “Well? I thought you were meant to be protecting me here, angel. You know, nameless monster, wants to eat me?”

“Oh, yes,” Aziraphale said quickly, as if he _had_ forgotten. White wings materialized behind him and he began to glow a little. Now _that,_ of course, _was_ lovely, it was beyond lovely, really, it was glorious to see the beautiful white-haired angel framed by feathers with the sheen of pearls, and that glow that turned his skin to gold.

Crowley would never say any of that, of course, but Aziraphale, bastard that he was, gave Crowley a smile that said he heard it anyway.

“I’ll handle the whatever-it-is,” the angel announced, “and you keep _them_ safe.”

Crowley didn’t make one move toward the humans. “They were going to _sacrifice_ me, Aziraphale.”

The angel tilted his head. “Technically, they weren’t, dear, because you’d have been safe in the circle.”

“It’s the thought that counts,” Crowley growled.

“If you protect us, we’ll pay you!” Anna gasped out.

Crowley and Aziraphale looked at them. “With _what?”_ Crowley asked.

“Well,” Jacob said, “you must know how to summon demons properly, right? We can summon one you hate, maybe an even more powerful one, and get _him_ to give us the money. And then you can kill him! Everybody wins!”

Crowley looked at them for a long, slow moment before asking, “How the fuck are you two still alive?” He motioned to them. “Well, I can’t be the one who puts an end to it. Get over here, I’ll protect you.”

They had scarcely reached the demon when there was a loud noise and the whole building shook. A cloud of purple smoke appeared in the center of the floor, with an almost overpowering odor. There was a burst of light, and then the smoke was gone, and a creature stood in its place.

There were a couple of things about this manifestation that Crowley was not expecting. First, the smell. It wasn’t sulphur or anything particularly hellish. It smelled like...freshly mown grass. Second, the creature standing there looked like an ordinary dog. Not a Hell Hound, not a three-headed monster. If Crowley had to guess, he would have said it was a black labrador retriever. Its ears were up and so was its tail, wagging gently.

“Well!” Aziraphale said in delight. “Look at you! Oh, aren’t you adorable?” He put out a hand and the dog trotted up to him. Aziraphale crouched down to pet him, his white wings trailing gently on the ground.

Crowley, however, took a couple of steps backwards. “What is that thing?” he hissed.

Aziraphale smiled at him, scratching behind the dog’s ears. “It’s nothing but a Church Grim, darling. You know, the spirit of a dog that guards consecrated ground, especially if it’s used as a cemetery. Funny, isn’t it, a spell designed to bring up a beast of Hell and it conjures quite the opposite type of guardian.” He frowned in confusion, taking in Crowley’s obvious displeasure. “He’s quite harmless, my dear.”

Crowley rested his hands on his hips. “And what, exactly, does this harmless dog guard _against?”_

“Oh. Right. Forces of darkness. Devils. Demons.”

“Mmm-hmm,” Crowley said, backing away a little farther as the dog made its way over to Anna and Jacob, who petted it briefly. But when it went to investigate Crowley, the hair on its back stood up and it bared its teeth, growling low in its throat. Crowley growled right back.

“Be polite,” Aziraphale chided him, although Crowley hadn’t even started it. “The poor thing’s just been summoned here in the middle of its day—”

“So’ve I!” Crowley reminded him.

Aziraphale got a chagrined smile on his face. “I’ll just send him back, shall I?” He waved his hand, and the purple smoke reappeared. The dog trotted off to it happily, disappearing in another wave of pleasant country air.

“Well,” said Aziraphale, turning back to Jacob and Anna. “All’s well that ends well, I suppose. Have you learned a lesson today?”

Crowley snorted. “These two? I doubt it. I’d be surprised if they lasted another six months.”

Aziraphale sighed, folding his wings back onto another plane. “You know, you’re probably right. I suppose we ought to do something.”

“What, _help them?”_ Crowley demanded. “Are you serious?” He folded his own wings away but left his claws.

“Well, it’s just—they’re going to cause a lot more trouble if we don’t address the problem now.”

Crowley scowled at Aziraphale for a moment, but as always, it was useless for him to try to disagree with the angel. “Right,” Crowley sighed. “How much money did you steal?”

“About ten thousand dollars,” Anna told him.

Crowley gaped at her. “Ten thousand—” He ran a hand through his hair. “Fine, here.” A pile of bills appeared in his palm. But when Anna reached for them, he pulled them just out of reach. “This is to repay what you stole, and nothing else. Clear? The chain of mistakes ends here.”

“Yeah,” she said, and Crowley allowed her to take the money.

It wasn’t until he watched the grin spread across her face that Crowley got the first inkling that something was wrong. He immediately looked to Aziraphale and realized that the angel, of course, was not only aware of the issue, but had clearly caught onto it far sooner than Crowley had.

Aziraphale was...well, he was Aziraphale. He _had_ been Guard of the Eastern Gate once. Not a soldier. A guard _._ A post like that was not given to good fighters, but instead only to those angels clever enough to be able to tell instantly who was friend and who was foe.

(It had certainly worked from the first moment Aziraphale had met the Serpent of Eden. For all the protests that Aziraphale was duty-bound to make about being friends with a demon, he had known to trust Crowley immediately. He’d even confessed to the demon about giving his flaming sword away, which was something Aziraphale hadn’t even told God.)

At the moment, there was a little glint in Aziraphale’s eye that Crowley recognized, the Guard reappearing for a moment. Crowley found himself biting back a smile.

“Not that it will do much good,” the angel said, nonchalantly, looking at the money.

“What do you mean?” Anna asked, looking up in shock. Her fingers clutched around the bills.

“Oh, I just mean you won’t have long to enjoy it,” Aziraphale said. “Or don’t you know what happens to a human who sees a Church Grim?” Both humans stared at him, and Aziraphale frowned. “Oh, that is sloppy research. And after you went to all the trouble of setting this up.”

“Setting what up?” Crowley prompted.

Aziraphale turned those lovely blue eyes on him. “I mean the whole thing, dear. Extorting us for money. It was very well done, except that they made one serious error. Well, two if you count the Grim.” 

The humans had looks of surprise and unease on their faces, and Crowley was grinning now, because Aziraphale wouldn’t, he wouldn’t gloat over something like this. Crowley had to do it for him. “What was the other mistake?” he asked.

“They got your name wrong. Well, to be more accurate, they got it right.”

Crowley might not have been quite at Aziraphale’s level in this sort of thing, but he was well practiced at following the angel’s lead. “The sigils in the circle were for Crowley,” he said. “Not Crawly.”

Aziraphale gave him a pleased smile. “Exactly. You see, the thing is, my dear, they couldn’t use your proper, later name unless they knew a great deal about you, that name isn’t in any book. So at the very least, they aren’t the amateur demon summoners they pretend to be.”

“So you had this from the time you saw the chalk circle?”

“Oh, yes,” Aziraphale confirmed casually, as if it wasn’t a bloody brilliant thing to have done. “And that’s where it all falls apart, I’m afraid, because no one who knows enough to use your true name could possibly think _Cerberus_ exists.”

The humans’ expressions showed a gathering horror and Crowley loved it.

“And so then I started wondering,” Aziraphale continued, “why chance using your correct name and hoping we wouldn’t notice? A costly risk like that, it had to be on purpose. They must have wanted to be completely sure they were getting _you_ and not some other demon. But why would that be so important? What’s so different about you?”

Of course. “Because if I’m in trouble, I’ll call an angel for help.”

Aziraphale beamed at him. “Exactly. Here, I’ll walk you through it.” He pointed at the humans. “These two need money. It’s entirely too dangerous to try to force a supernatural being to give them funds, and these two are not beginners, they know that. Therefore, they elect to use trickery. They decide to try to get an angel to take pity on them and help them. I’m afraid this was never a summoning for you at all, my dear.”

“It was for you.”

“Yes. Because how would you get an angel to appear? If they’d summoned me directly and demanded money, I would definitely have refused. If they’d even prayed for money, I’d be quite reluctant. So they summoned _you_ into the circle, the one demon on good terms with an angel, and let _you_ find a way to get me here. Which you did brilliantly, by the way, darling.”

“Of course I did.” Crowley smirked at the terrified humans again.

“And then they play on our sympathies,” Aziraphale went on. “Make themselves seem pathetic, that they really are in need of protection, if only from themselves, and they haven’t really done anything, have they? They haven’t hurt you, they only summoned a mostly harmless dog spirit by mistake.”

“And the way to keep them out of future trouble is to take pity on them and give them the money,” Crowley finished.

“Precisely.”

“Except there is no way that anybody this stupid comes out of this situation perfectly well and ten thousand dollars richer.”

“Indeed.”

“If you’ll recall, I _did_ think it was unlikely that anyone this stupid would still be alive.”

Aziraphale sighed. “Well, you were actually right to, I’m afraid. Because despite all this planning, they missed the part about the Church Grim. I imagine they just thought it was a harmless dog.” 

He glanced at the humans and spoke reluctantly. “It’s an omen of death for a human to see a Church Grim. Normally, they’re quite benevolent and try not to appear to people, but of course, he could hardly avoid that if you summoned him.”

“You’re making this up,” Anna accused, in a trembling voice.

“I’m afraid not, dear.”

“Then there has to be a way to reverse it!” Jacob cried.

Aziraphale gave him a look of disbelief, and said slowly, “You can’t un-see a dog.”

“How long do we have?” Anna whispered.

Aziraphale shrugged. “Oh, hard to say. If we were at the dog’s home graveyard, the answer would be that you two would be the next ones buried there. But with the dog removed from its environment, I’m afraid the math gets more complicated. Of course, as all of us here know, the death of your mortal body is only part of the journey. If I were you, I would spend my remaining time attempting to procure a ticket to the destination of my choice. Either Upstairs or Downstairs.” His tone softened then. “You know, in a way, you could see this as a blessing. Not everyone gets to know that their days are numbered, so too few pay attention to what’s really important.”

oOo

It wasn’t until that night, when Crowley was nearly asleep, his head resting on Aziraphale’s chest and arms around his hips, that he was sure. “A Church Grim’s not an omen of death, is it?” he asked.

Aziraphale moved aside the book he was reading and frowned down at the demon. “Of course it is.” And then his mouth twisted into the slightest of smiles. “If you happen to see one while standing next to the altar of an otherwise unoccupied church during a thunderstorm.”

“Aziraphale, you bastard.”

The angel gave him a displeased look. “You know, in some ways, it _is_ a blessing to have the motivation to focus on your afterlife destination. Plus they came out ten thousand dollars richer. My conscience is clear.”

“Whatever helps you sleep at night, angel.” Crowley narrowed his eyes at him. “Of course, you _don’t_ sleep, do you?”

Aziraphale just went back to his book. “I don’t see how that’s at all relevant, dear.”

**Author's Note:**

> We all know, of course, that Crowley is extremely clever, especially in working temptations (and getting himself out of messes that he himself has usually caused), but I am a big fan of Aziraphale being written as being absolutely brilliant, but purposefully hiding it. Crowley knows, of course, because he’s the only person who gets to ever see the real Aziraphale. But it’s part of Aziraphale’s long-term survival strategy to have most people (including the other angels) think he’s a lot less capable than he actually is. Crowley’s got his sunglasses to hide his nature, and Aziraphale is no less camouflaged.
> 
> And gold star to anybody who caught onto the con before Crowley did. I did not. I got to the point of Anna grinning about the money and thought— you know, that seems really suspicious. So I had to go back and try to figure out what Aziraphale might have picked up on that would make this all a con. I find that I write my twisty endings better that way, because if I plan them from the beginning, I give them away in the beginning. The only thing I changed was to have Aziraphale take a good look at the sigils right when he came in. The humans were already using the name Crowley and mentioning Cerberus, who didn’t exist, and that was enough of a foothold (or, you know, minor plot hole) to get a twist ending in. I had planned on the Grim being harmless, so to end the fic after the humans turned out to be naughty, I switched him to harmful (and then back to harmless, Aziraphale, you bastard) and that was that!   
> (PS Aziraphale knows exactly what was summoned, you can tell because he's not worried about Crowley's safety. He's just having fun annoying his husband.)
> 
> [Church Grim](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_grim), although I took liberties with the legend.
> 
> Thank you for reading! Comments and kudos are so appreciated! And please feel free to check out my other works.  
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